Employment

I got my first job when I was seventeen, working as a cook at a McDonald's, which I did full time for a year. Since then my employment status has been punctuated fairly regularly by things like moving, going to school, travelling, and just plain old getting laid off. The result is that, in the nine years I've been in the workforce, I have a worked a staggeringly high number of different jobs, none of them for longer than a year, and most for less than six months.

Sometimes I wonder if that's a reflection of my non-comittal personality.

The second job I had was with a company called Acklands-Grainger, picking orders in a gigantic warehouse. They celebrated their 125th year during my time there. Those of us in the warehouse were given a celebratory pen, emblazoned with the company logo. It was a pretty nice pen, actually.

I spent two summers working for the public works department of a small town with the improbable name of Sexsmith, Alberta. We refered to it as "Sex Town." Perhaps we had juvenile senses of humour, but we had fun.

Sexsmith's quaint little Main Street
Image from here

I once worked on an assembly line in a factory that built trusses. We worked 50 to 60 hours a week there. The overtime pay was fantastic, but I just couldn't handle spending that much of my life in a factory. So I quit and used a bunch of the money I'd saved up to travel around Japan for a bit. It was worth it.

Another time I had a warehouse job I was overqualified for simply because I spoke fluent English: (seriously, the ad I'd responded to said "only minimal English skills required."). This was actually really cool, as it meant many of my co-workers were immigrants, some of them brand new in Canada. I got to work with people from Ethiopia, Cambodia, China, Namibia, India and other places besides. I learned how to greet people in Amharic (sälam!) and Mandarin (ni hao!). Unfortunately, as much as I loved the diversity, it didn't make up for the terrible management and even worse pay. I wasn't sad to leave that place.

Up until last Friday I was working as a shipper\reciever for a concrete specialist supply store. It was the smallest company I'd ever been a part of: there were only six of us. I got to drive a forklift around and phone shipping companies. But, as you can imagine, the concrete business slows down a lot during the winter, and my boss figured that with November here they could only afford to keep one person in the warehouse. So I am now, once again, unemployed.

This isn't entirely a bad thing, actually. I have a bit of money saved up at the moment, and I should be able to get EI, so I'm not in an urgent panic to find a job right away. That means I can take a bit of time to look for a place I think I'd enjoy working at, rather than taking the first thing that comes up.

It's also an oppurtunity for change. Other than my stint in a McDonald's kitchen, every job I've ever had has been general labour. I've never worked in customer service, and I think it might be nice to try something new, if I can. I would also love it if I could get something that's part time, as that would allow me to take a class or two starting in January.

In other words, while being laid off means not making money, which is unfortunate as I think about going back to school and the cost of transition-realted things like electrolysis, it also means having options. And that part of it I rather like.

Stupid tunnel

This whole is thing is stupid.

I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. I know it's there. I know it's real. But I've stopped moving towards it. I'm no longer putting one foot in front of the other. And why? Because... it's too dark, I guess? I mean, come on, you could stub your damn toes walking around in the dark!

So instead I'll just sit down here and bash my head against the tunnel wall for a while.

Of all the lights at the ends of tunnels that Google images returns, I like this one.
Image from here.

Okay wait, what does this metaphor even mean?

What it means is, because I haven't been taking any actual steps toward transition or even making any effort to express my gender, I feel depressed. And because I feel depressed, I lack the motivation to take those steps or make that effort.

And I am just barely restraining myself from actually bashing my head against a wall— that part's nearly not a metaphor.

Stupid tunnel.

My mom wrote a letter

Driving home from work last Wednesday I heard the familiar ping of an incoming text message. I checked it when I got home. It was my mom, saying she needed to talk to me, and asking if now was a good time to call. I texted back "sure" and my phone promptly rang.

"I think we should tell your grandparents about your being transgender," she said, after the initial hellos.
"Uh, okay. You mean like, soon-ish?"
"Yeah. I think they should know. And I'm sure they'll accept you."

She explained that her parents and my dad's parents had both specifically enquired as to how I was doing recently. Both of my grandmothers are active on Facebook— (that tells you something about my age, eh)— and she figured that some of what I'd been posting recently might have made them wonder about me.

Personally I thought that she might just be reading into things, making connections between phenomena the way our brains tend to do. But regardless, my grandparents have to learn at some point. So I said okay.

As we talked about it it became apparent to me that she had, in fact, already written out an email to her parents and my dad's parents explaining the situation. She was phoning to get my permission to hit the send button. So I asked her what she'd written.

"Like, it explains that you feel like a woman trapped in a man's body, and that..."
"Uh, well,"  I interrupted her, "that's not the terminology I would use."

(Of course, the old "x trapped in a y's body" is a reasonably good answer to the what is trans? question if you're talking to someone who's completely unfamiliar with the concept and have at most one second to explain it. But otherwise it's pretty inadequate.)

"Oh," she replied, "what would you say?"

And if I had had the presence of mind to do so, I might have come up with something like, "I feel internally that I am mostly female, despite the fact that my body appears male, and this incongruity causes me a significant amount of discomfort."

But instead I said, "Oh, I don't know. I guess that's close enough." (Not a great answer on my part, I know.)

At this point I asked her to just read me the whole thing, which she did. And for the most part it was pretty good: explaining and clarifying some aspects of what trans is and isn't, as well as stating that I'd always been this way and that my parents' relationship with me was still good.

Unfortunately it also included some theologizing that I found a little unpleasant. There was something along the lines of: "We don't know why God allowed our child to be born with this condition, but we believe all things happen for a reason." She actually felt the need to clarify that they believe God intended me to be born with a male body.

That stung a bit, to be honest. Personally I think that "a thing happened, therefore God wills it" is a pretty horrifying way to look at the world. But I didn't argue with it being in the letter: she was writing from their perspective and if that's what they believe, it might as well say so.

After reading the whole thing she asked, "does that sound good?" I said "Yeah, I guess so" and she sent it.

And then she started talking about Minecraft and how monsters had recently blown up her house. (She and I play on the same server, along with my brother, which is pretty cool). And I realized that I am a lot more comfortable talking about video games with my mom than about my gender.

This was over a week ago now. I haven't heard anything from her about how or if my grandparents responded, but I'm not too worried about it. They're good people.

Mom's letter may not have been the exact words I would have chosen. But I am certainly glad I didn't have to be the one to write it, coming out being pretty low on my list of favourite things to do. So... thanks ma! :)

Sad songs

Gender isn't always at the forefront of my mind, contrary to what you might think from reading this blog. There are times when it matters less. Sometimes, especially if I'm focused on a particular task, I can forget about it altogether. This happened the other day at work. Which, of course, was nice.

It didn't last very long, though. Without really thinking about it, I started humming a tune, as I often do when I'm working. Then I started singing the words to it, again without really thinking about what they were.

The problem is, the song happened to be For Today I am a Boy, by Antony and the Johnsons. And the words I started singing were:

One day I'll grow up, and I'll be a beautiful woman
One day I'll grow up, and I'll be a beautiful girl
But for today I am a child
For today I am a boy

Well... crap. So much for not thinking about it. I was pretty bummed out the rest of the day.

I've got to hand it to Antony Hegarty, though. He* is very good at capturing a certain mournful feeling that can come with living in not-quite-the-right gender.

Oh gosh. Now I just listened to this song again and I'm actually crying.

So... just to balance things out a bit, I'll add that I had a great weekend hanging out with friends and with my brother and sister-in-law. It's not all bad! :)

*He prefers male pronouns, even though he doesn't identify as male.

Facebook and bigotry

Yesterday on Facebook I posted a link to this darling photo and blurb about two Iowa women finally getting married after more than 70 years together. It's pretty darn heart-warming stuff.

I did so knowing that some of the people I'm friends with on Facebook aren't exactly open-minded. I knew it was entirely possible that the comments could devolve into a stupid religious debate about whether or not homosexuality is immoral. But even if that happened I assumed everyone would at least be charitable about it.

But nope. That didn't happen. The charitable part, I mean...

To be honest I was pretty upset about this last night. Remember, this isn't just some random person on the internet; this is someone I know personally.

The tricky thing is, I'm ultimately a recovering bigot myself. So I know that people can change and I know that simply returning insults does nothing to help that process.

And that makes it very hard to know how to reply, or if I even should.

Lovely Blog Award

Okay, before I get to anything else I first have to mention that it actually snowed here this week. The only consolation is that Calgary got more than us. (hehe)

That aside, I am the recipient of a Lovely Blog Award, thanks to Because I'm Fabulous. Thanks, Michelle! :)

I'm supposed to write seven things about myself. So... here goes:

1.
I am very interested in space travel. Okay, actually like, kind of weirdly obsessed with it. For some reason the idea of visiting other worlds has completely captured my imagination. I’ve spent a lot of time reading all about the history of space age, and the great scientists (Tsiolkovsky, Goddard, Oberth, etc.) who helped to bring it in. And I’ve spent a lot of time reading about what its future might look like, too.

Sometimes there is a small amount of sadness that accompanies this interest— I mean, there hasn’t even been a moon landing in my lifetime, it feels like we’re going nowhere! But I can always indulge in hard sci-fi to make up for it.

Suffice it to say, if humans haven’t landed on Mars before the end of my life, I will probably be very disappointed.

Sunset over Gusev crater on Mars. This is another world. And we can go there! I find that thought exhilarating.

Image credit: NASA/JPL/Texas A&M/Cornell

2.

I loooooove sushi. If I head ten different lifetimes I could devote to mastering different skills, in one of them I would be a sushi chef. For this lifetime, though, it’s just a hobby. And I still don’t make it nearly as often as I would like.

3.
Music is a hugely important part of my life. Not just listening to it, but playing it, too. I play drums and flute, but what I'm best at is piano. I’ve never had any music lessons (other than voice), I just started mashing keys until it sounded good.

Eb2 to A5

I can sing a bit, too. I hope it doesn’t sound braggy, but one thing I’m quite proud of is my range: I can hit notes as low as Eb2 and as high as A5. I’ve decided that if I do transition, I will continue to use that entire range, even the low notes. I refuse to pretend to be less capable than I actually am just for the sake of passing.

Oh, and I like writing songs. I started doing it when I was 12 and have never really stopped. That adds up to a lot of songs. A small handful of them might even be worth listening to. (And yes, an embarrassingly high number are about space travel).

I don't know of any experience I enjoy more, or find more rewarding, than performing music in front of people.

4.
I don’t play a lot of video games but when I do it’s usually Minecraft. I main Kirby in Super Smash Bros. (deal with it). I tried Dwarf Fortress once but gave up in hopelessness and despair.

Dwarf Fortress: I don't know what the hell's going on, but I'm pretty sure I'm losing.
Image credit: Casey Johnston

5.
I have an intolerance to citric acid. This means that my body doesn’t produce enough of the enzyme it needs to digest it; (this differs from a true allergy, which is an immunological response). Apparently this is a pretty rare condition— yay, I’m special!

So, I can eat small amounts of citric acid (which is good because it's in everything and you need it to live), but I do have to watch how much. Citrus fruits (oranges, lemons, etc.) are completely out of the question. Things like cherries and grapes are okay in very small amounts. Anything with tomato sauce is a bad idea. I definitely can’t drink wine.  :(

6.

I used to be a bad-ass anarchist. This was an extension of the religious views I held at the time. Basically, I saw Jesus’ teachings as requiring absolute non-violence, and I saw the state, the military, and capitalism as inherently violent and therefore needing to be opposed. (I wasn't the only person to get that from Jesus, by the way, Christianity has a long tradition of anarchist thought).

Since then, as I've changed from a believer to a skeptic, I’ve had to move away from the kind of moral absolutism that underlies anarchism. It’s very easy to be an absolutist when you’re basing your beliefs on “the infallible word of God”— much harder when you’re basing them on the entirely falsifiable findings of science.

To be clear, I still care about social justice, I’ve simply de-mythologized it. I now think violence is wrong not because God says so, but simply because it hurts people. (This is an improvement, because, like, there were a lot of things the God I believed in said were wrong that didn't actually hurt anyone.)

7.

I'm not originally from Alberta: I was born and raised in British Columbia, (Canada’s western-most province). It’s been eight years since my family moved here but in a way I still feel like an ex-pat. I am, it seems, a child of the Fraser River, and the forests of Cascadia will always be my home. Oh yeah, and go Canucks!! :)

Okay, I'm sure that was way more than I needed to write. Ayways, the actual rules for the award are as follows:
1. Thank and link back to the person who nominated you.
2. List the rules and display the award.
3. Include seven facts about yourself.
4. Nominate 15 10 some other bloggers and let them know about the award.

Since it's a chain-letter-y type thing, I will add that I'm passing it on obligation free: if you want to take part, go for it. If not, that's totally okay too. :) And so, I hereby nominate:

• A Part Time Girl

• An Unexpected Queerdom (although clicking over there her blog seems to be down at the moment...)

• Two Spirits - One Halle

• Cassidy's Quest

• Transfinite Love

Casual misogyny

I was walking down the street last Sunday. It was getting dark. I was in a sort of androgynous mode, by which I mean I wasn't making any attempt to pass as any particular gender. Like, I was carrying a purse, for example, but only because it's what I keep my wallet and phone in.

A very drunk man stumbled toward me and grumbled out, "Heeey, gorgeous! How are you??"

Okay, casual misogyny. That's a new experience. I looked down and kept walking. As I went past he said, suddenly and loudly, "Hey, wha—? Maaaaaaaan! You're a man!!"

I continued to ignore him, and he wandered off. The whole experience was kind of icky, though— certainly a "transition milestone" I could've done without.

The world's a different place when it sees you, even if only for a moment, as a woman.